Best South America international card?
 

Hi.
I'm going to South America for an holiday, and I would like to buy a good GSM international card, 'cos italian roaming costs are simply crazy ( 6€ / min.!!!)

I will visit Perù, Ecuador and Colombia, and it seems that the only prepaid card I should be able to use is 09, because other cards haven't full coverage of the three countries.

Do you think I will be able to manage it? 09 operator will work well on those countries?
Any suggested other solution?

Thanks!

P.S. I have a nokia e65 quad band phone, will it works?

I don't know which SIM is best but it's important in S. & Central America to have all four bands. Ecuador has only 850 MHz. Costa Rica has only 1800. Others have strange mixes of 850, 900 & 1800. Your quad band phone should work fine.

Many of the intl. SIM cards don't cover a whole lot of S.A. countries. Check the sticky that compares rates and coverage for some SIM sellers.

...mike

I just came back from Colombia and Peru two weeks ago.

The 09 Mobile did not work in either country. It registered (there were up to three networks available) but was for emergency purposes only or did not allow to dial out. People could not reach me either.

In Peru I used a German T-Mobile (around $ 3 for outgoing and $ 2 for incoming calls). I would recommend a local Claro SIM card which sells for 30 soles (US$ 10) which gives you free incoming calls.

In Colombia I bought a TIGO SIM card for 10,000 pesos (US$ 5.00) which gave me free incoming calls, messaging for about 50 cents to foreign numbers and reasonable rates to other TIGO subscribers. Calling out is very expensive and I cleaned out my account after less than a minute. Vouchers are available everywhere. Ther is a also Movistar. Best to go to their websites to check them out www.tigo.com.co

The small print in the TIGO contract explicitly says that their networks cannot be used for call-backs etc and this is why very few foreign SIM cards work in Colombia.

The situation in Ecuador is similar. Last year I tried my T-Mobile and it did not work. A Peruvian Claro SIM card was of no use either.

Any quad phone should work.

Wolf

Beware that depending on where you go it might not make much sense to get an international sim. There are some countries which have surcharges which make roaming in these countries very expensive. I.e. Mexico and Peru to name two off the top of my head. Its much better to get a prepaid sim if you are going to be in either of these places.

I was wondering If UM worked in these two countries. Has anyone tried the sim in these?